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“Good.”

“And stop analyzing me,” I huffed.

He smiled. “But I’m really good at it.”

“You’re not.”

“Fine, I’ll stop.”

“Good.”

We headed toward the exit, waving and thanking the instructor as we did. My phone buzzed in my pocket with a notification. I pulled it out as we walked through the barn toward the gravel parking lot and our cars.

“Oh,” I said in surprise.

“What?” Theo asked.

“It’s Alice, Cheryl Millcreek’s daughter. She sent me a message.”

Chapter

twenty-one

“ASK YOUR THIEF OF Amother what she did with my grandma’s surfboard,”Max said, waving his hand at my phone. “That’s what you should say.”

“I’m obviously not going to say that,” I said. It was the following day. Theo and I had just finished an evening workout at his house because his mom had hosted a brunch that morning and didn’t want us there working out. We now sat on the boardwalk behind the diner, waiting for Deja, who was closing up inside. “I actually want her help.”

“I thought it was good,” Theo said.

Max gave him a high five. It was just the three of us. Lee was at some family dinner.

A pelican was trying to land on the rounded top of a post at the edge of the boardwalk, its feet slipping and its wings flapping with each failure. The sun sat atop Morro Rock, about to sinkbehindit.

I should’ve answered Alice back the day before, but I didn’t want to sound accusatory, and every message I’d composed and erased over the last twenty-four hours had sounded exactly that. Maybe not as bad as Max’s suggestion, but still.

I pursed my lips and said, “How about justI heard your mom was a surfer. So was my grandma. I’m looking for a board they might have shared?”

“That’s good,” Max said.

“It is,” Theo agreed. “She might actually be willing to respond to a message like that.”

I typed in the words and pressed send. My back was leaned up against the railing running along the edge of the wooden walk that separated the restaurants from the bay. I could see Deja sweeping through the windows of the Purple Starfish.

Max must’ve seen her as well because he said, “I’m going to hurry her along.”

“You just want to score leftovers,” I said as he walked toward the door.

“Is that a possibility?” Theo asked, ready to follow him.

“I’ll report back,” Max said, and pushed the heavy side dooropen.

Theo watched him go, then settled onto the ground beside me, his shoulder bumping mine.

“I watched some videos this morning of you kicking a football,” I said. I’d been to all the football games earlier this year even though Jensen rode the bench. But the truth was, I hardly watched the games. I mostly talked to my friends. Or we’d buy food or make fun of the uniforms. I’d only gone to support Jensen. And I’d never seen Theo kick a ball before finding the videos that morning.

His head turned toward me. “What? Why?”

“I used to watch tape all the time for soccer to improve my form and identify mistakes. You never did that?”